


Civic Responsibility 101

by celli



Category: Crooked Media RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Kid Fic, LA Era (Crooked Media RPF), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-01
Updated: 2019-02-01
Packaged: 2019-10-20 05:33:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17616455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/pseuds/celli
Summary: Divorced dads Jon Favreau and Jon Lovett meet-cute at a school board meeting. An introduction to the body politic follows.





	Civic Responsibility 101

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kisatsel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kisatsel/gifts).



> I cannot thank my betas enough: cinderlily, anatomical_heart, and missmollyetc. 
> 
> kisatsel, I started writing this for you in 2017, and then I hit my stupid head and, well, you know the rest. I hope you like it!

Jon Favreau was not going to get involved in politics.

He swore that when he left the White House. He swore that when his marriage failed to outlive the Obama administration. He swore that when he and his daughter Alex moved into their new house. He swore it up and down and back again, until he sat in his first PTA meeting and found out that the high school music program - the reason he'd fought for custody and uprooted his family all the way to California - was in danger because of school board budget cuts.

Now here he was, at the school board meeting, a group of people with slightly less name recognition than the President but slightly more influence over his daughter's future.

Jon waited in the long line for public comment, idly ogling the short guy a few parents ahead of him with thick biceps and an ass that wouldn't quit, as people talked about SAT prep and special education and important and wonderful things that weren't the music program, when one of the board members sighed and said, "Mr. Lovett, the comment period for the anti-bullying initiative closed last meeting."

"I could be here for something else!" the short guy protested.

"Are you?" the chair asked.

"No," Mr. Lovett said, and over the exasperated noises from the chair, said louder and faster, "because I won't be here for anything else until you do more than send the guidance counselors to a webinar - a webinar, I ask you - when kids in this district are literally trying to kill themselves to get away from it."

He went on for two minutes, despite objections, waving a page of statistics and talking authoritatively about early intervention.

"Mr. Lovett," one of the other board members finally half-shouted, "has your daughter even been bullied yet?"

"You think I should sit around and wait for it?" he shouted back and walked away. He planted himself in the row next to the podium and stared at the board, arms crossed. Jon was close enough to hear his phone go off, but Mr. Lovett ignored it and kept glaring.

Jon finally got to the podium and tore his gaze back to the board members. "I'm Jon Favreau," he said into the mike, and when there was a rustle in the crowd, hurried to add, "sorry, not that one." It got the laugh he'd planned. "I'm here because of how important the music program is to my daughter." He meant to go on, he did, but he couldn’t help but say, "but I also want to support Mr. Lovett. I know how important anti-bullying initiatives can be--"

The board members, as a whole, groaned, and Jon hurried back to his prepared remarks about the music program and its benefits. But he could see Mr. Lovett out of the corner of his eye looking at him instead of the front of the room.

*

"Hey, Favreau!"

Jon turned from where he was fighting his way through a crowd of parents to where Mr. Lovett was on a stone bench, legs crossed comfortably under him. Jon said goodbye to Alex's friend's mom and let himself get swept along until he was standing in front of the bench.

Mr. Lovett held out a hand. "Jon Lovett," he said. "Not that one, either. Just call me Lovett."

"In the - people used to call me Favs, if that's easier," Jon said, trying to suppress the wince. Go ahead, blurt out your stupid bona fides, Favreau, who you trying to impress?

"I think if I call you Jon, we can both keep track," Lovett said with a grin. His hand was smaller than Jon's and warm and Jon let go just before it would be embarrassing.

“Is your daughter in middle school?” Jon asked.

“Lilah’s in fifth grade.” Lovett held his hand up at roughly an eleven-year-old’s height. “You can tell she’s not old enough for middle school because she still thinks her old man’s funny.”

“I remember those days. Vaguely.” Jon sat on the bench by Lovett’s knee. “Alex is a sophomore. She thought I was cool for about three minutes in 2008 and now she’s done with me.”

“What’d you do in 2008, fly the Space Shuttle?”

“Got hired at the White House,” Jon said. “But let me tell you, the bloom faded off that rose pretty quickly.”

Lovett gave him a narrow-eyed look and pulled out his phone. 

“Are you googling me?” Jon asked.

“Director of Speechwriting, eh? That’s a little cool.”

Jon laughed. He pulled out his phone “L-o-v--”

“-e-t-t,” Lovett said. 

“Ooh, comedy writer. That’s way cooler than speechwriter.”

“That’s not incorrect, and yet,” Lovett said. “Tell your kid you met a Hollywood writer today. She probably hasn’t been here long enough to know that we’re the least-cool of them all.”

Jon opened his mouth to suggest--coffee? A playdate? He had no idea--but Lovett’s phone went off again, and he turned away as he answered it. “Hey, mini-me, what’s up? No, I didn’t promise not to call you that, just not where your friends could hear.” Jon watched him talk for a moment, then his own awkwardness hit him and he slinked away.

*

A new move and a new house had somehow led to a new dog, and Jon would laugh but, really, every time Leo curled up against Alex while she was sitting on the couch or got up on Jon’s bed at night where he wasn’t supposed to be, Jon was secretly thrilled. It wasn’t that he was lonely. It was just that he worked from home and was a little short on contact with the rest of humanity. Dog...manity...would have to suffice.

“‘Dogmanity’?” Tommy asked incredulously when Jon shared his latest insight over Skype. He shook his head. “You need to get out. Out of the house. Out of your own head.”

“I’m fine,” Jon said. He pulled Leo into his lap. “You’re just jealous.”

“I am totally jealous,” Tommy said. “But your entire world can’t be clients and your kid, Favs. We’ve talked about this.”

“I get out. I went to the thing, the school board thing.”

“That counts as your kid. Unless you got that hot screenwriter’s number and haven’t mentioned it.”

“Who said he was hot?”

Tommy looked into the Skype camera, _Office_ -style. 

“Gotta go,” Jon said quickly. “Gotta pick Alex up from lessons and then take Leo to the get-to-know-you vet appointment.”

“Oh, well, out and about to the _vet_ , clearly I take everything ba--”

Jon hung up on him with a certain amount of satisfaction.

*

“Everything looks good. I expected it, given our experiences with your breeder,” Dr. Jackson said, one hand still scratching Leo’s head. “But it’s good to confirm it. We’ll let you know when he’s due back in for shots, all right?” He looked down at Leo. “Thank you, Leo,” he said solemnly.

Another dog barked on the other side of the door, and Leo woofed back, ears perking up.

“I think I hear Pundit,” Dr. Jackson said, laughing. “I just finished up with her. She’s a doodle too, from the same breeder.”

“Maybe they’re related,” Alex said. “Are you saying hi, Leo?”

Leo woofed again. The distant dog woofed back.

“I’ll send the tech in for Leo’s rabies shot,” Dr. Jackson said.

“Oh, I can’t watch that,” Alex said instantly. Jon couldn’t help but wince in agreement.

The vet laughed. “Why don’t you go up front and pay. We’ll bring him out to you.”

Jon was mid-credit card when there was a flurry of barking and raised voices in the back. He and Alex eyed each other, but soon a vet tech came out of their exam room, flushed and carrying Leo’s carrier.

“They really wanted to make friends,” she said. “But here you go.”

Jon signed the slip as Alex picked up the carrier. “Did you lose weight in there, Boodle?” she asked. “You’re light as a feather.” She leaned over to look at Leo, and went suddenly still. “Dad,” she said, “this isn’t--”

“Wait!” The door on the next exam room over burst open. 

“Lovett?” Jon asked dumbly.

“Jon Favreau, for the love of--you have my dog,” Lovett said, one hand clutching his hair. A girl who could only be his daughter peered around him.

Leo ran out of the room and up to Alex as she opened the carrier. The other dog - Pundit? - jumped out and nosed at Leo. They barked at each other. They really did look alike - they even had very similar haircuts. Pundit was just a little smaller.

“Our dogs appear to be friends,” Lovett said. “No, no, everyone breathe.” This was to the vet tech, who was beet red and stammering apologies. “Nobody got far, we all figured it out in time. I need to get Pundit one of those collars with her name written on it in large large type if we’re going to be patronizing the same establishment as the Favreaus.”

“Good plan,” said Jon, who had been toying with demanding a referral elsewhere. “Or, you know, we could let them hang out outside the vet.”

Suddenly everyone was staring at him. He shifted his weight, realized he was doing it, and made himself stand still. “I’m just saying, if it keeps them from destroying this office and our own sanity--”

“Yeah, sure,” Lovett said. He gave Jon a look Jon couldn’t quite place, but it wasn’t unfriendly. “Let me finish up while these guys hang out and we’ll talk.”

*

“Hey, Al,” Jon said, knocking on Alex’s door.

“Come in!” she called. Jon opened the door; she was sitting in front of her heavy-duty music stand, cleaning her flute.

“So--”

“Is this about the school board?” she asked. “Because I helped you with your speech and wrote my letter to the editor already this week, and--”

“I’m done with you for this week,” he said. “Promise. I’m taking Leo to the dog park to play with his new friend, wanna come?”

“Oh, _Leo’s_ new friend?” Alex raised an eyebrow in a way that reminded Jon uncomfortably of Tommy. “Nah, I’ve got homework.”

“No, you don’t,” Jon said.

“Nope, bye, have fun!” Alex waved at him.

Jon was still blushing when he and Leo arrived at the dog park. Pundit was already there, running after a ball. She stopped when she saw Leo, barked at him, then kept going. Jon let himself and Leo through the gate and unclipped the leash; he dashed off after Pundit. A flurry of barking ensued.

“Mr. Favreau,” Lovett said as Jon approached him.

“Mr. Lovett,” Jon said. “How goes the bullying project?”

Lovett snorted. “I haven’t bullied anyone lately, thanks.”

Jon flushed. “Sorry, I meant--”

“It’s cool, I don’t expect you to be good with words or anything,” Lovett said. Jon let out an involuntary giggle. “It’s going slowly. I’m back on the agenda for the next meeting, anyway.”

“Hey, that’s awesome,” Jon said.

“If it keeps one fewer kid from being tossed in a dumpster…” Lovett trailed off. “Not part of your high school experience, one supposes. Sitting at the cool table and all.”

“I’m gonna say no to all of that,” Jon said. “No dumpsters, but I ran cross-country. Cross-country is not cool.”

“I was in math club,” Lovett said. “And I think there was some homophobia in there even before I came out to myself. I had my share of dumpsters.”

Jon had a flash of Lovett, shrunk down to Lilah’s size, struggling--he squashed the urge to put a hand on Lovett’s arm, who knew how it would be received. “I wasn’t out as bi ‘til college,” he said. “So I avoided - but - is there anything I can do to help?”

Lovett smiled at him, and fine, he was hot. Jon couldn’t help but smile back.

*

Jon was buried in Alyssa’s book on her White House years, giggling at one of her stories even though he’d already heard it a hundred times, when his phone rang. He looked at the name and his heart thumped a couple of times. “Hey, Lovett,” he said.

Lovett didn’t even say hi, just launched into a rant on the latest roadblocks to the bullying problem - this time from Lilah’s future middle school principal. Jon relaxed back in his chair and listened, communicating his sympathy and amusement at the appropriate times. It was really...it made him feel--

“Why don’t you come over and rant at me in person?” he said abruptly, right in the middle of a really funny comparison of the principal to Tywin Lannister. 

“--wait, what?” Lovett asked, sounding less than assured for the first time since they’d met.

“Come over and, and talk about it more,” Talk about it _at_ me, he almost said.

“Lilah’s in bed already,” Lovett said. That wasn’t a no, exactly. Jon waited a moment. “You could come over here,” Lovett said, his voice rising just a little bit at the end of the sentence.

Jon was already standing up and looking around for his wallet. “Sure.” He stopped to breathe. “Just, uh, text me your address? I’ll let Alex know.”

It took all of twenty minutes to get to Lovett’s, only because Jon spent five minutes in the liquor store down the street trying to decide between wine and beer. He compromised on a craft beer, which Lovett grinned at when he opened his front door.

“Did you bring me artisanal beer? Please, God, let it be artisanal.”

“You don’t have to drink it,” Jon said.

“Bullshit. Come on in.”

Lovett, it turned out, could rant like it was his job. “Well, it used to be,” he said when Jon complimented him. “I did stand-up for a while. Got me my first sitcom job.” He smiled. Jon, who was starting to catalogue Lovett’s expressions, hadn’t seen this one before. “Got me Lilah.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I fell in love with a club owner and we decided to have kids right away. I was an infant myself, sometimes I can’t believe it. Thank God, though.”

“I know what you mean,” Jon said. Lovett turned that new smile on him, and Jon wanted to reach out to him more than - he took a long drink of his beer.

Lovett’s smile went a little wry. “Turned out Jeff didn’t really want daily life with a kid. He sends holiday presents and comes by once a month or so to be the fun dad. Lilah mostly thinks it’s ridiculous, but she puts up with it.”

“I’m losing Alex for winter vacation and six weeks in the summer, and I got a third bedroom just so Liza will always be welcome.”

“That’s good of you,” Lovett said.

“Well, I dragged her only child across the country for a music program that it turns out has questionable funding. It’s kind of the least I can do.”

“There are good programs on the East Coast, I assume,” Lovett said, and Jon sighed.

“Alex wanted it - I don’t know if she wanted more sun, a new start, she doesn’t talk about it. But it was - is - a good program, and…” He elided over the three-way fights, the court hearings, and the painful silence from the East Coast for the first couple of weeks. “...I wanted her to have it,” he said finally.

Lovett apparently picked up on Jon’s reluctance. “And you ran straight into the school board. Which, I’m told every school board makes parents want to scream, but this one has to win some prizes for it, right?” He was off and running on another rant about the anti-bullying program, and Jon sipped his beer and listened with amusement and gratitude.

He tore himself away at the end of that beer and said, “I should get back, I’m too old for any more beers on a work night.”

“I’ll grab the rest of them out of the fridge for you,” Lovett said.

“Nah, save them for...another time,” Jon said. Lovett looked at him sideways but nodded. He followed Jon to the door.

“Thanks for providing an audience,” he said, smirking as he leaned against the doorjamb. “It was like the old days.”

Jon caught himself swaying toward Lovett and reversed it. “I definitely would have applauded,” he said, and backed his ass out to his car before he could do anything he might regret later.

*

Jon was still lecturing himself about Lovett a week later, waiting for him and Pundit to show up at the dog park. Tommy’s advice aside, Jon was still a fresh divorcee, not exactly a prize for a new relationship. Not to mention he hadn’t dated a guy since - since - since a while back. There was no point in ruining a possible friendship to come on to a guy (probably poorly) and try to date him (definitely poorly). Much better not to. 

“Jon!”

Jon looked up and waved at Lovett and decidedly did not think about anything inappropriate.

Pundit and Leo did their now-traditional woof-sniff greeting, and Lovett and Jon settled on a bench (not _their_ bench, Favs, you weirdo) to toss tennis balls at them. Leo tended to run for them first, but Lovett had learned to time his throws a split second later so Pundit had something to run for.

“You’re the smartest doodle,” he told her smugly as both dogs ran back to them.

“Leo’s just as smart,” Jon said, tossing the tennis ball up so Leo could jump and grab it.

“Mm, sounds fake,” Lovett said.

They tossed the tennis balls, chatting idly about the girls, until the dogs were run out and drooping at their feet. Jon learned that Lilah was a math prodigy, to match her dad’s degree in it, and talked a little about giving Alex piano lessons when she was little, until it became obvious he couldn’t be there enough hours she was awake to give lessons and do the rest of what fatherhood demanded.

“They’re going to kick us off our bench,” Lovett said finally, reaching down to ruffle Pundit’s ears, then Leo’s.

“Starbucks?” Jon asked. He hid his surprise at his own words by picking Leo up.

“Sure, as long as you promise not to get the wrong drink,” Lovett said.

“There are incorrect Starbucks drinks?”

“Oh, don’t get me started.”

*

Jon shifted his weight in the school fair kissing booth line. He didn’t even know why he was _in_ this stupid line, but charity was charity, he guessed. As he got closer, he could hear the resident of the booth - turning people away?

“No thanks. Uh, pass, please. Sorry, lady, I don’t kiss...ladies. Oh, sir, you’re so close, but no.”

He got to the front, and of course it was Lovett. Jon waited for the inevitable rejection, but Lovett just looked at him.

“You’ll do, I guess,” he said finally. “At least you care about bullying.” He leaned forward; and Jon did too, his heart pounding--

And woke up in his own bed, embarrassingly hard given the PG-ness of the dream.

“Oh, God,” he muttered, and tried to smother himself with his pillow.

*

The dog park and Starbucks became a semi-regular thing. Every Saturday they carved out an hour or so to meet up, but sometimes on a random Tuesday or whatever Lovett would text something like “writing is bullshit, let’s go” and unless Jon had an actual client call scheduled, he would. He even rescheduled calls with Tommy despite the vast amount of mocking that resulted. The girls came sometimes, but honestly the age difference meant that, aside from one intense whisper campaign the first time, they mostly stared at Pundit (Lilah) or a phone (Alex) and made excuses whenever they could. Jon always invited Alex, but he didn’t exactly mind her rejection. He needed to examine that more closely some day. Or never.

Jon and Lovett were both on their bench at the dog park when the next school board agenda hit their phones. “Nooooo,” Lovett said, dropping his head on Jon’s shoulder. “Why am I last again? Nobody cares. Why doesn’t anyone care?”

Jon hesitated, then gently patted Lovett on the back. “I care.”

“Oh shut up, the music program is first.” Lovett didn’t move.

Jon let his hand settle between Lovett’s shoulderblades. “I didn’t do it.”

“I know, I know.” Lovett sat up abruptly; Jon realized his hand was still on Lovett’s back and pulled it away. “It’s gonna suck, though.”

“It’s a school board meeting, they all suck.”

Lovett moaned again, and Jon put a hand on his arm. “Hey. This is good work you’re doing. They’re going to give in eventually.”

“Sure, Jan,” Lovett said, looking over at Jon and grinning, and then refused to explain the joke no matter how many times Jon asked.

*

Jon had very (over-) prepared for the next school board meeting; statistics about the kids in the music programs and anecdotes from guidance counselors about colleges they’d been accepted into, along with some quotes from Obama (that he may have written himself back in the day) about the importance of the arts. He edited three of the four quotes out of his speech on the fly after Lovett looked over his shoulder and rolled his eyes meaningfully.

Lovett’s two minutes were also a masterwork, with what must have been a painful story about his own school bullying and a bunch of statistics as well.

“Thank you, Mr. Lovett,” the chair said when he had finished. She looked around the room, locking eyes with Jon for a moment. He felt sweat build along the back of his neck. “The truth, folks, is that we have enough money to adequately fund one or maybe two of the programs requested by the school district for next year, but not all four from tonight’s agenda.”

Jon and Lovett - and a handful of other people - immediately jumped to their feet and started yelling. “Why didn’t you tell us this before?” was the common refrain.

The chair stared them all down. Lovett was the last to sink back into his seat next to Jon. He was shaking with anger; Jon wasn’t much better.

“We’ll discuss this in private session and announce our decision at the next meeting,” she said. “Any new business? _New business only_ ,” she said when Lovett moved to stand.

*

Lovett didn’t show up at their usual Saturday afternoon dog park time. Jon sat on the bench for half an hour. Leo milled around a little, looking as lost without Pundit as Jon--as Jon felt, but what was he supposed to do? Finally he packed up his dog treats and his dignity and took them to his car.

Which made it as far as Lovett’s house, apparently on its own since he hadn’t meant to at all. Lovett’s car was in the driveway, so Jon huffed out a breath, abandoned that dignity, and walked Leo up to the front door.

Lovett answered the door, his shoulders already in a defensive hunch. “Sorry, I had to take Lilah to - listen, I should have texted, I just--”

“I’m not mad at you,” Jon said. “I just. Look, if you didn’t write the school board an extra letter I’ll eat Leo’s leash.”

“Of course I did.” Lovett’s shoulder’s came even closer to his ears. “Of course you did.”

“Of course,” Jon said. “But it’s not your pick, or mine, those assholes will make their own decision and then we’ll deal with it. But that doesn’t mean we have to stop, stop whatever--”

“Whatever?” Lovett asked. “What does ‘whatever’ refer to, Jonathan Favreau, Director of Speechwriting?”

Jon lunged forward - Leo barked as the leash tightened - and kissed Lovett.

Lovett didn’t respond at all, and Jon started to pull back, stricken. But Lovett said “no, nope,” got a hand around the back of Jon’s head, and pulled him back down.

At some point the leash slipped out of Jon’s hand and he felt Leo push by him into the house. _Good idea_ , he thought, and nudged Lovett back until the screen door shut behind him. Lovett still had one hand on the door and one in Jon’s hair, and Jon’s hands were tight on his hips. Lovett stopped moving so that they were flush against each other’s bodies. Jon heard himself make a low noise at the contact, and Lovett’s lips turned up against his.

It took Lovett a few tries to break off the kiss; Jon kept following his mouth back, even though he knew very well what Lovett was trying to do. He wasn’t sure what would happen when they looked each other in the eye again, was the thing, and Lovett wasn’t really fighting him off either. But finally Lovett put a hand on his chest and shoved him gently back.

“No, really,” he said, and Jon flushed, but Lovett was smiling at him. “I could do this for about a week, but Lilah’s tutoring session is over in ten minutes and she’s fifteen minutes away.”

“Okay,” Jon said.

“So you have to let go of me,” Lovett said patiently.

“Okay,” Jon said.

“Now would be a good time.”

“Okay. I mean, right.” Jon made himself let go. 

Lovett smiled and leaned up to kiss Jon one last quick time. “I’ll text you.”

“You’d better.” Jon ducked away to grab Leo’s leash and led him out. He looked back as he got in his car and Lovett, standing at the driver’s door of his own car, was grinning at him. Jon blushed and climbed in.

*

The next two weeks were an exercise in frustration. It seemed like the girls had activities at consecutive times every day, so whenever Jon was free Lovett would be sure to be at Quiz Night, and then Jon would have to drive Alex half an hour away for a performance, and then, and then. Both of them got busy with work. The school board thing seemed to hang between them, even though neither of them mentioned it, and Jon was obsessively haunting the school district site for the next agenda. He lived from text to text - Lovett was not a sweet nothings kind of guy, but even long slightly misspelled rants on everything from office politics to dog groomers made his heart jump when he read them. He had it bad. He didn’t know how this had happened so fast and so intensely; he could only be glad that Lovett occasionally chose to rant about how stupidly hot Jon was or how the universe was against them ever seeing each other again. Jon had a secret folder on his phone with screenshots of those.

Jon wasn’t bad at ranting, but he couldn’t compare to Lovett, so he talked a lot about Leo and Alex. Waxing poetic about dog training and flute playing was probably super boring for Lovett, but he answered most of Jon’s texts right away, and even called him one night, laughing, after Jon maybe slipped a little and whined about how very much classical music was being played in his house.

“Let me guess, you’re a Coldplay kind of guy,” he said as soon as Jon answered the phone.

“My favorite right now is Hozier,” Jon confessed, feeling his cheeks go red.

Lovett laughed and made fun of pop music until Lilah’s bedtime. Jon went for his run the next morning with a spring in his step and nearly outran poor Leo.

Finally, _finally_ Lilah had a mini math camp at UCLA Extension and Alex had tech week for the play she was in the orchestra for. Jon considered highlighting that Saturday on his calendar, but it wasn’t like he was going to forget it.

*

Jon found it incredibly hard not to just toss Alex out the front door with cab fare when he got the text that Lovett had dropped Lilah off in Westwood, but he settled for yelling up the stairs, “Alex, get going, you’re going to be late!”

“I am not!” she yelled back down. “Is your watch off?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Come on, Al.”

“Don’t call me Al!” she shouted.

Inspired, he sat at the piano and played the opening bars to the song "Call Me Al" until she screamed with frustration and thundered down the stairs.

“Fine, I’ll be weird and early, just stop playing that song,” she said.

Jon grinned and texted Lovett on his way out the door.

*

Lovett was sitting on Jon’s front stoop when he got home. The barking from the side yard told Jon Pundit had already found a home with her partner in crime.

“I was going to wait for your text, but I didn’t feel like it,” Lovett said. He was squinting against the sun, his hair a little longer than he usually kept it and curling wildly.

“Do me a favor and stand up?” Jon asked, approaching the porch.

Lovett stood on the first step up. “Oh, this is great, I’m taller than you,” he said.

Jon hauled him down into a kiss.

“Wow,” Lovett said a few heated minutes later. “In front of God and everybody.”

“I have been thinking about kissing you for two weeks, which is about thirteen days and twenty-three hours too long,” Jon said. 

Lovett leaned in, pressing his forehead to Jon’s. “Please tell me you’ve thought farther than that, or I’m gonna be really embarrassed.”

“Come inside and find out,” Jon said. This time Lovett kissed him.

Jon got as far as the bedroom, Lovett’s hand warm in his, before the nerves got the best of him. “I - um, I was married for a long time, and I haven’t really--”

“Gotcha, babe,” Lovett said, resting his free hand on Jon’s waist. “Nobody expects anything too crazy today.”

“Define crazy,” Jon said. Lovett laughed his way into the kiss, and Jon loved it. He brought both hands up to cup Lovett’s face. “You make me crazy,” he said, barely breaking away from his mouth. “You’re been making me crazy for--”

“One week, six days, and twenty-three hours?” Lovett offered.

“For however many hours it’s been since I stood behind you in the line at the school board and thought your ass looked great,” Jon said, and he and Lovett grinned at each other.

After that, it turned out it was a lot easier to lay down with Lovett, to let Lovett pull his shirt and jeans off, to run his hands over all the beautiful skin revealed when Lovett reluctantly shed his own clothes. Jon strongly appreciated Lovett’s naked ass, which made Lovett strongly blush. 

“We can’t all be tall lanky golden gods,” Lovett said, and Jon knew he was blushing even more strongly.

“You don’t even know what you look like, I could stare at you for days,” Jon said.

“Shut up,” Lovett said, wrapping his hand around Jon’s dick, “just shut up already,” and Jon didn’t exactly shut up when Lovett ducked down and put his mouth on him, but it definitely changed the subject.

“Oh my God,” he managed to say, choked, “that feels--you feel so good, Lovett, please, oh, my God, please, please.” He didn’t even know what he was saying, just straight-up begging, or for how long, while Lovett kept one hand hard on his hip and the other at the base of his cock, moving his mouth up and down the length of it like he had all the time in the world, never hesitating. Jon groaned. “ _This_ makes me crazy, never stop making me crazy, please.” And then Lovett fucking _laughed_ and the vibrations from that were a whole new level of sensation; it took Jon about three seconds after that to come, clutching at Lovett.

He let go, finally, and when Lovett sat up Jon pulled him down into a kiss. “That was amazing. You are amazing. I’m just babbling and I don’t even care. How do I make you feel this good? Half as good? I can try anyway.”

“Just keep looking at me like that,” Lovett said, and tangled his fingers with Jon’s on his cock. Jon kept his eyes on Lovett’s face and let Lovett’s hand guide his, trying to memorize this moment and this sensation and this emotion, all of it. 

Post-orgasm, post-cleanup, post-Lovett insisting he wasn’t a cuddler while not letting Jon move more than three inches away, Jon rested his head on top of Lovett’s and said, “You know what I like about politics?”

Lovett snorted. “What?”

“Nothing.”

Jon felt Lovett nodding.

“Except you,” Jon said.

*

They sat in the front row at the school board meeting, hands so tightly clasped Jon could see white around Lovett’s knuckles and he was losing feeling in his ring finger. The girls sat on either side of them. Lilah was holding Lovett’s far hand and Alex was looking supremely bored - yet undeniably pale - at Jon’s side. He put his hand over hers on top of her flute case; she let it stay there for a whole two seconds before jerking back and pretending she didn’t know him.

The chair of the school board fumbled with her glasses, looked out what was frankly a crowd after all the letters to the editor that had flown back and forth in the last month, and somehow managed not to look either Jon or Lovett in the eye. “The two projects we’re recommending for funding,” she said slowly, “are the expansion of after-school tutoring and the sports safety program.” 

A flurry of cheers broke out. Lilah made a low noise, and Alex slumped in her seat.

Lovett jerked, and only Jon’s pressure on his hand kept him from flying out of his chair and at the stage. “Stay with me,” Jon said, low and certain. “We got this.”

Lovett gave him a flat stare. “How.”

Jon grinned - he couldn’t help himself - and dragged Lovett to his feet and to the line for the podium, which was collecting at an alarming rate. The girls followed. “You, me, and politics, baby?” he said. “We got this.”

“Bullshit,” Lovett said.

“What about you, me, politics, and the six federal and state grants I tracked down this week through an old contact of mine from the campaign? Do _we_ got this?”

Lovett’s face was a study from fury to disbelief, and then to just the faintest beginnings of hope. “Are you serious?”

“Half bullying, half music.”

“Oh, my God.” Lovett reached up and gave Jon a smacking kiss. Both Alex and Lilah immediately faced forward and crowded away from them; Lovett just laughed and kissed Jon again. “I can’t believe you deus ex machina-ed us out of this disaster.”

“D-O-E-us ex machina-ed us, maybe,” Jon said. The line advanced. “I can’t wait to lay it all out in front of the board.”

“I can’t wait to point out that if they’d done their jobs, nobody would need to be shrieking at them,” Lovett said.

“While shrieking at them.”

“Excuse me, I would never.”

Jon cut off the high-pitched denial with another kiss - the girls could just deal - and basked in Lovett’s annoyance. He could live with this side of politics. Yeah, he could _definitely_ live with this.


End file.
